Sight Singing - Advanced Rhythm
This Week’s Sight Singing
Meter Changes; Hemiola; Irregular Meter; Metric Modulation
Meter Change
Composers of the nineteenth century and beyond often used metronome markings to indicate how to proceed when the meter changes. Study the two procedures carefully: does the beat remain constant and the notes within the beat change, or the other way around?
Hemiola
Hemiola is a common rhythmic device used over many centuries of composition. In hemiola, there is a change to note groupings without a notated meter change. This can make it sound as if a meter change has taken place, however.
Irregular (Asymmetrical) Meters
Sometimes we see time signatures with a 5 or a 7 in the numerator. While it is definitely possible to conduct these in 5 or 7, this week we will focus on conducting them in broader patterns, such as “2+3” for a time signature with 5 in the numerator. The beats will be unequal, and this may take some time to get used to. As always, subdivide. This makes irregular meters much easier to understand.
Solo: Metric Modulation
This exciting solo was composed by Dr. Leonard Garrison, inspired by the music of the American composer Elliott Carter. Carter famously pioneered the concept of “metric modulation.”
Metric modulation is defined as a change in tempo (i.e. pulse rate) and/or the subdivision (i.e. the grouping) which is derived from a note value or a note grouping heard before the change.
You will need to write on this warm-up and show it to your section professor before performing it to make sure you have done the math correctly. It is not hard, but it requires some thought and some multiplication.
- Beginning = 80 to the quarter note. How would we measure the half note beat? (Hint - divide 80 by 2!)
- m. 3 - remember, those tripletized quarter notes are a division of the half note. What is one of them worth? (Hint - multiply the half note tempo marking by 3!)
- Line 2 - When we write “half note = dotted half note,” that means the beat remains the same. Therefore, one “normal” quarter note is the same as one of the tripletized ones from the previous measure. Congratulations, you’ve metrically modulated! Write in the new tempo marking.
- Going into line 3 - four of those tripletized eighth notes are now equal to one of the quarter nots at line 3, measure 1. Therefore, the new quarter note marking will be the old one divided by three quarters.
- Quintuplets! Each one of them fits into a half note. Divide the marking you just wrote for the quarter note to get the marking for the half note.
- Line 4 - we will now divide a half note into some interesting subdivisions. Can you count to 7? Hint - most people can’t. A septuplet may be best expressed “in your mind’s ear” as “one-two-one-two-one-two-three” or “one-two-three-one-two-one-two.”
- Penultimate line: The first two measures actually sound the same but are notated differently. What does that mean for the tempo marking?
- Penultimate line, measure 3 - the eighth note stays the same. Therefore, to find the tempo marking for the dotted quarter, you should first find the tempo marking for the eighth note. Multiply the marking for the half note by 7 to get that. Then divide that number by 3 to get the dotted quarter note marking.
- Penultimate line, last two measures: the beat is the same. What does that mean for the performance of the triplets? (Hint - they aren’t faster!)
- Last line, mm. 1-2 - be careful! The quarter note is the same!!
- Last line, mm. 2-3 - the beat does not change, but the division of it does.
- Last line, last measure: if the previous dotted quarter note is equal to the quarter note in this measure, do the two measures sound the same?
Playlist
The works on this playlist are in irregular meters. Listen carefully until you can identify the meter of the piece and it becomes familiar to your ear.